It seems that Republicans in the General Assembly have finally gotten around to talking about jobs after weeks of debate about everything else, denying federal loans to community college students, denying health care to thousands of people who are uninsured, repealing annexations, and rolling back consumer and environmental protections.

The breakthrough came Wednesday afternoon in the House Elections Committee when Republicans unveiled the latest version of legislation that is designed to protect a few jobs — their own. That's the only plausible explanation of the Voter ID bill in the form that passed the committee on party-line vote, that it is all about electing Republicans.

The other reasons to impose another barrier to voting simply don't make sense. Supporters claim it will reduce voter fraud, but an official with the State Board of Elections told the committee Wednesday that there were 14 possible cases of double voting out of 2.7 million votes cast in the 2010 election.

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